Pause for the next 30 seconds and think about your approach to social media as a financial professional. If you’re using it to engage with clients and prospects, do you have a solid plan in place or are you taking a “ready, fire, aim” approach? If the latter, it’s time to take a step back and reevaluate, since investing in social media marketing without a plan can be a waste of precious time and resources.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Social media marketing requires planning. Financial professionals who don’t develop a plan risk low return on investment, even if they’re using state-of-the-art digital tools to drive their social media marketing efforts. This is true because the barrier to entry is low. In just a few clicks, you can get all of your social media accounts up and running. With a few more clicks you can post content and even have a basic ad running.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
But that’s where the simplicity and efficiency end.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter are designed to keep us engaged and using the site\u2014this is a good thing for their<\/em> audience traffic, but a potential challenge for financial professionals. Without a plan in place, it’s easy to sink too much time into social media marketing for a relatively small ROI. A plan will help you stay focused and provide the discipline to know when you’ve reached the limit of your productivity on any social platform.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Financial professionals who rated themselves as \u201cmature marketers” in eMoney’s Next Best in Class Marketing Tools<\/em>\u00a0study rightfully identified \u201cmarketing strategy and planning” as the most important area in their marketing efforts. eMoney’s advice is to plan first and pick a tool once you have that plan in place.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Here are a few of the key elements you should consider when building that plan:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Creating a social media plan supported by the right digital tools is just one of the hurdles to successful marketing for financial professionals. eMoney’s ebook, The Financial Advisor’s Guide to Digital and Social Media Marketing<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0provides an in-depth analysis of building a marketing plan, selecting the right tools, and the marketplace trends that make social media marketing a potentially great investment for your firm.<\/p>\r\n To learn even more about how to be successful on social, watch our webinar “10 Steps to Build a Winning Social Media Strategy for Advisors” below.<\/p>\r\n\r\n